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Vladimir Biriulin and Evgeny Alexandrov of Gorodissky & Partners explain to Simon Crompton the impact of Russia’s new IP court, the Customs union and other factors on trade marks in the country

A common objective of a brand owner when entering into a licensing agreement is to ensure that its licensee assumes all responsibility for manufacturing the licensed products and all liability for consequences as a result thereof. While the typical trade mark licence includes certain indemnification provisions aimed at ensuring that the licensor achieves this objective, a few recent court decisions have highlighted instances where such standard indemnification provisions do not sufficiently protect licensors. Such decisions reveal an emerging issue with respect to product liability that brand owners engaged in licensing their trade marks must pay careful attention to, namely the possibility that they will be held liable for injuries resulting from the use of a product made by its licensee even when the brand owner is not directly involved in either the manufacture or sale of the products.

Having a single-class system, a trade mark owner seeking registration in Thailand for the same mark in different classes will be required by the Trade Marks Registrar to 'associate' its marks. Section 14 of the Thai Trade Marks Act states that the Registrar may order an applicant of similar or identical marks, relating to goods either in the same class or in related classes, to associate these marks to avoid confusion as to the owner of the mark.

According to the Patent Law, where a statutory or designated deadline in a patent application or other patent-related procedures is not met, any belated attempts to further prosecute or take procedural actions will be refused unless the failure to meet the deadline is due to force majeure or other factors not attributable to the applicant. In view of such strict and inflexible stipulations, it is not unusual for patentees to lose their hard-earned rights simply through an oversight.

A recent decision by the Swiss Federal Supreme Court has ended a 12-year battle between LEGO System and Mega Brands over the validity of Lego's three-dimensional building block trade mark registrations in Switzerland. The Supreme Court has now confirmed the nullity of Lego's respective trade mark registrations on grounds of technical necessity of the registered building block shapes.

After six failed attempts, Mexico has completed its journey to successful protection of privacy, say Rosa María Franco and Juan Carlos Hernandez of Basham Ringe y Correa

Sergio Silva of Silva and Associates discusses to what extent Mexico’s imminent adherence to the Madrid Protocol is advantageous for the country’s IP owners and economy

Gilda González Carmona is director general of AMPROFON, which represents Mexican record companies, and president of the Coalition for Legal Access to Culture, which is helping to draft legislation to update the country’s copyright law. Eileen McDermott spoke with her about the project, and why it is crucial to Mexico’s creative industries

How to apply for a utility model in Mexico. By Heriberto López of Becerril Coca & Becerril

Enrique Diaz and Dhania Portilla of Goodrich Riquelme y Asociados explain potential problems with the practicality and rigour of Mexico’s new guidelines on comparative advertising